Assassination attempt on Colombian presidential candidate and senator

[Meg]

From the Independent:

A presidential candidate in Colombia has been shot and seriously wounded at an event in Bogota, according to reports. Miguel Uribe Turbay, a senator, was in critical condition and a suspect has been arrested, the Agence France Presse news agency reported. Early reports said he had been shot in the head or in the back.

The mayor of Bogota, Carlos Galán, was quoted by CNN as saying that Uribe was receiving emergency treatment after being attacked in the Fontibon district on Saturday. In a statement Colombia’s presidential office condemned the attack. It said: “The National Government categorically and forcefully rejects the attack that the Senator of the Republic, Miguel Uribe Turbay, was the victim of in recent hours.”

Shocking video and pictures on social media appeared to show Uribe shot while addressing a crowd of people; shocked members of the public running from the scene; a man being held down on the ground by law enforcement officers; and blood smeared on the front of a vehicle.

Uribe, 39, is the son of Diana Turbay, a journalist who was kidnapped by the Medellin drugs cartel and killed in a bungled rescue attempt in 1991, three days before her son’s fifth birthday. His grandfather was Julio César Turbay Ayala, who served as president of Colombia from 1978 to 1982.

He is a member of the opposition conservative Democratic Center party and is running for the presidency in 2026.

The party released a statement calling the apparent assassination attempt an “an unacceptable act of violence.”

Colombia's Defense Minister Pedro Sanchez said a suspect had been arrested in the shooting and that authorities were investigating whether others were involved. Sanchez said he had visited the hospital where Uribe was being treated.
The South American country has for decades been embroiled in a conflict between leftist rebels, criminal groups descended from right-wing paramilitaries, and the government.

Someone caught footage of it. It's not too graphic IMO.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1931502010315981283

 

[Wandering Star]

Just before he was shot, he was saying:

Mental health! The main problem we have in Colombia!

It's ironic... And sad.

 

[Liliea]

Just before he was shot, he was saying:

Mental health! The main problem we have in Colombia!

It's ironic... And sad.

He had also just talked about the free carrying of weapons to defend against crime and then a 14 year old boy is the one who shoots.

At the moment the leftist party, opponent of the candidate, speaks of a self-attack, which is absurd, and the president Gustavo Petro writes that it is the attack on “the son of an Arab” referring to his mother - Diana Turbay daughter of a right-wing former president and killed in a kidnapping by the cartel of Pablo Escobar - exalting the feelings of the people and all the offended political class that showed their sadness and rejection in front of the clinic where they took the candidate shouting, Fuera Petro” (Get out Petro). In that sense, Petro's statements in X have been criticized since the beginning of his tenure for being merely colloquial, incoherent or for being divisive and encouraging violence.
In general, it seems that the situation in Colombia is becoming more and more serious, to put it mildly, because of the fear that political violence will return as in the 90s.

Atentado a Miguel Uribe en vivo: iniciaron las marchas en apoyo al precandidato presidencial

El precandidato continúa en estado crítico luego de que le realizaran dos complejas cirugías cerebrovasculares en la Fundación Santa Fe luego de que un menor de edad le disparara en repetidas ocasiones durante un evento proselitista en el occidente de Bogotá en la tarde del sábado 7 de junio

www.infobae.com